The Citizen, 2004-12-23, Page 5Other Views
Those revolting animals
THE CITIZEN, THURSDAY, DECEMBER 23, 2004. PAGE 5
Ontario's Liberal government has been
told it cannot win its fight .against
doctors. but the doctors have fewer
friends than they used to.
Progressive Conservative health critic John
Baird claimed the public in taking sides will
choose doctors any time over Liberal
politicians.
Polls traditionally have placed doctors at the
top of the most liked professionals, while
politicians usually have languished at the
bottom, which is understandable.
People see doctors when they feel sick and
the physicians mostly help them feel better,
while politicians are thought of mostly as
raising taxes.
But, while the public on the whole still has
respect for doctors. they are not quite on the
pedestal they used to occupy.
In the current skirmish, many will .note the
government has offered family doctors pay
increases up to 35 per cent over four years if
they join. teams that offer more, and, better
serve the public, and they may feel this is what
government is supposed to be doing.
The doctors view it as a slur the province has
asked them to reduce the torrent of
prescriptions they write under its drug plan,
but 'it has been acknowledged for years they
prescribe drugs too often and some that have
negative side-effects when they react with
each other. •
The public also sees a constant procession of
doctors dealt with by courts or the profession's
disciplinary tribunals for sexually assaulting
patients, usually women, and must feel doctors
let their own off lightly. '
In the latest a family physician faces charges
An unseasonable drought has dried up
kangaroo watering holes throughout the
surrounding area, forcing the creatures into
Canberra's parks and gardens.
And the marsupials aren't being meek and
gentle about it. Adult kangaroos stand as high
as a man and can kick like a mule — a mule
with a shiv attached to each hoof. The
kangaroo has a sharp central claw on each rear
paw. Its favourite tactic is to hold prey in its
front paws and disembowel it with the rear
ones. Never get between a thirsty kangaroo
and a watering hole.
And that goes double for a drunken moose.
Most Canucks know that the moose is a
shy and elusive animal, seldom seen in the
woods, much less in built-up areas. At least,
that's the way it works when the moose is
sober.
'Once they get into the sauce, moose become
monsters.
Ask the Swedes. Sweden has a moose
population of some 300,000. Normally, these
Nordic moose are law-abiding, even timid, but
each autumn many of them get into windfalls
— wild apples that fall from the trees, ferment
on the ground and turn into a form of
backwoods hootch. Moose gobble them up
and that's when all hell breaks loose. ,
This past autumn Swedish police were
juggling reports of inebriated moose
blundering into traffic, crashing into living
room windows, staggering into empty
swimming pools — even executing home
of assaulting 39 patients. He is still in practice
because his governing body suspended his
licence for only six months for similar
offences in 2001.
The College of Physicians and Surgeons of
Ontario has admitted many doctors are
disruptive and behave badly. "Everyone in the
medical profession knows someone whose
behaviour causes problems for other people,"
it said.
Examples include "the surgeon who refuses
to answer his pager while on call, the
academic staff physician who bullies medical
students and the community physician who is
rude to patients."
One doctor commented that the criticisms
are long overdue and his colleagues are given
immense power, but' are - exempt from
supervision and need to clean up their act.
People now asked 'to take sides will have
come across some of these doctors lacking a
bedside manner.
The public has read being treated by doctors
can be injurious to health. A study showed
185,000 patients are harmed while being
treated in Canadian hospitals each year and
between 9;000 and 24,000 die as a result of
health-care professionals, including doctors.
invasions.
Kari Lindeman lives in a small town in
central Sweden called Karlskoga. One
evening he was watching television with his
daughter when a half ton of stewed moose
came through the patio door.
That's...through the patio door. It was
closed and locked at the time. The moose
skidded across the living room floor, smashed
the TV, tore the curtains off. their rods, trashed
some floor lamps and a chesterfield,
then staggered out the shattered patio door
again.
"It was terrifying," said Mr. Lindeman. "We
don't live in the woods...we'd never seen a
moose in the neighbourhood before."
Nothing uglier than a mean moose drunk.
Unless it's a larcenous beaver.
I refer you to the case of the Lucky Dollar
Casino heist in Greensburgh, Louisiana last
month. Thieves got away with $70,000 U.S.,
but Louisiana police, alter some superb
detective work, managed to track down more
than half the loot.
In a beaver dam in the nearby Amite River.
Police theorize that the casino bandit panicked
and threw the loot into the river, after which
the beaver, delighted to encounter a source of
free wallpaper, grabbed the bills and used
them to line the inside of their dens.
That's the official theory. Me, I think
Louisiana authorities have unwittingly
uncovered just one underground cell of a
sophisticated money laundering scheme
designed to finance animal insurrection
around the world.
Pistol-packing puppies in Louisiana?
Unruly 'roos in Australia? Unglued ungulates
in Sweden'? Co-incidence? I don't think so.
My advice: go give Rover a dog bone right
now. Stroke your cat. Make sure Polly has
plenty of crackers. We need to mend this rift
before things get ugly.
making mistakes.
Some doctors are reported cherry-picking
their patients, turning away those with chronic
illnesses and preferring to treat those who take
up less time.
Many doctors have been slow to accept
nurse-practitioners trained to take over some
jobs traditionally performed by doctors and
whose value has now been proved. The
doctors argued they would lower health care
standards, but there is suspicion they merely
want to keep their turf.
Some doctors have strained relations with
nurses and one brusquely grabbed a nurse's
arm in an operating room, forcing her to have
a cast up to her elbow and be off work two
weeks.
Many people fed up with having to wait for
a doctor must have found their blood pressure
rising further when doctors admitted their
profession commonly helps relatives and
friends jump queues to obtain faster treatment
' for anything from face pimples to cancer.
The public never knows what the average
doctor earns, because any figure it is given
includes so many almost retired doctors
handling a few insurance claims a year it is
unrealistically low.
But it may have noticed one northern
community, admittedly remote, wanted a
family doctor and offered $300,000 a year
salary, free housing, no overhead expenses,
moving costs, eight weeks paid vacation and
four return trips home a year—and still found
no takers.
If these sort of benefits cannot lure doctors,
there4tkitst be some well-paid doctors' jobs
elsewhere.
A time to miss them
T
t's a quiet pre-Christmas evening. The
glow of soft festive lights illumtnates my
small corner of the world and the cold
night scene viewed from my window loses its
chill.
0 Holy Night, the stars are brightly shining.
Relaxing back against my chair, eyes closed, I
feel the soft strains of carols stir the air around
me. The familiar songs have a magic that not
only speaks of the season, but of a treasured
past. I am suddenly a little girl on a similar
night many, many years ago. Together with
my parents we are travelling through the
streets of my hometown to see the lights.
Beside me,' is my grandmother, my mom's
mom.
Then 1 open my eyes, and am again a
middle-aged woman who finds herself feeling
just a little sad.
There is probably no other time of the year
when I find myself missing my grandmothers
so much. In their own definitive way they
made Christmas special to me. Some of it I
have carried through the generations to give
my own children, other parts could only ever
be significant to me.
The one thing that always comes to mind
when I think of Christmas at grandma and
grandpa's is food. My heritage is German and
apparently, Germans like to eat. My brother-
in-law, of a more dignified English
background, recalled to me recently his initial
dismay at the excess of edibles at his first of
our family Christmases. The table was
btirdened with different kinds of meats, with
pies, cookies, candies.
While there was no shortage of culinary
delights when Christmas was with my
mother's side, it is always my paternal
grandmother I think of when I remember
Christmas feasts. Grandma Ott was not a
traditional gift giver. Instead, she fed. Her love
was in the preparation of her massive meals, a
labour not as simple then as now. The turkey
and goose, the pickles, the vegetables did not
come from a grocery store.
It is with that same love, though not the
same pioneer spirit, that I plan and cook my
own Christmas dinner today. And as I do my
thoughts are with her.
Grandma Matthews was a holiday shopper.
And never a penny extra was spent on one of
her grandchildren than another. If she had to
she'd buy a bubblegum to balance it. I think of
her often as I tally my totals and count the
number of items for each stocking, worried
that one of my babies is going to be short-
changed.
She never showed a lot of ebullience but it
was still evident that my mom's mom loved
Christmas. From the holiday services, to the
season's music and its colourful displays, she
somehow conveyed her pure enjoyment at
every detail. I thank her for passing it on.
Another big deal for Grandma was the
shortbread. There never was and never will be
a melt-in-your mouth flavour to compare.
And every year, as I sink my hands into that
rich mixture of buttery flour, I can still
remember it.
And at times, when a carol plays I think of
the more personal memories. My Grandma
Ott was a big, sometimes gruff woman. Yet, I
remember a soft voice as she greeted me with
"Och, there's my girlie.", words that made me
feel special. I think of Grandma Matthews and
her generosity, her devotion to family.
especially her grandchildren, and I know what
a grandmother's supposed to be.
And as I sit and think of the gifts they've left
me, the grandma that I am today finds herself'
hoping she can do half as well.
One of my favourite poems is by an old
white geezer name of Walt Whitman.
It starts:
I think I could go and live with animals.
, They are so placid and self-contain'd..."
They also forgive a lot, animals do. We leash
them and saddle them; harness and hobble
them: we tether, corral and kennel them.
We also do things to them in scientific
research labs that would make a Josef
Mengele blush.
And do they revolt? They do not. They
wordlessly forgive us.
As Whitman says: They do nor swear and
whine about their condition
They do not lie awake and weep for their
sins.
Animals, alas for them, are beasts of infinite
forgiveness.
Well, almost. Fact is. an increasing number
of incidents seem to indicate that maybe, just
maybe, our long-time beasts of burden are
beginning to cotton onto the dirty tricks we
two-legged co-tenants have been playing on
them.
And maybe, just maybe, they're getting fed
. up and unwilling to take it any more. I refer
you to the case of Jerry Allen Bradford, a
Floridian moron who decided to get rid of a
litter of unwanted puppies by shooting them
with his .38. .
"I couldn't find homes for them." he
explained later.
Fortunately, one of the puppies beat
Bradford to the draw, brushjng the trigger with
his paw and putting a slug through Bradford's
wrist. The Florida Humane Society found
homes for ..the puppies. The Florida justice
system has likewise made room for Bradford.
In the county jail.
Animal insurrection. It's everywhere. Ask
Australians in Canberra. Cause of their alarm?
Rioting `roos.
Doctors have fewer friends